Helpless
by HDUC
Summary: What happens when you back a Time Lord into a corner, then put him in the dark with a beautiful woman?  10th Doctor/Martha
1. 18 jun 69

**My stories are becoming more and more ambitious, even though they start out as an excuse for smut. Anyway, this is something of a prologue to whet your appetite. Hopefully, there will only be two or three parts...**

**Enjoy!**

* * *

18 June, 1969

On the night we met Shakespeare, after the fight, the Doctor showed me to a large, comfortable spare bedroom, and invited me to have a kip. I was exhausted and grateful . When I woke, a little red leather book had appeared on the bed beside me. I opened it, curious, but it was blank.

I asked the Doctor why he'd put it there, and he averted his eyes, took a long pause (the trademark eye-aversion-followed-by-long-pause with which I was to become painfully familiar, and which signified an inner turmoil of some sort, one that he would never share with me) and said that he hadn't actually put it there. I chuckled at him and said he was a terrible liar, but he interrupted, and told me that the TARDIS must have done it.

"She does that…" he began, but he didn't finish.

"She does that… what?"

"Never mind," he said dismissively. "Come on, let's storm the breach once more!" Then he took my hand and dragged me down the hall back to the console room. The book was in my pocket.

After settling in for the next ride, I had a minute or two to think. I extracted the red leather book from my red leather jacket. On the first page, some words had appeared, in slightly erratic, but legible, handwriting. It said "31 March, 2007: Judoon Platoon on the Moon."

The next time I looked, after we'd left New Earth, the second page said, "Summer, 1599: The Mystery of Love's Labours Won," and the third page said, "Five Billion Years: How New is New York?"

"Oh, it's a journal!" I exclaimed aloud. "I'm supposed to write about our adventures!"

"Mm," the Doctor grunted.

I loved the idea of it. I wrote about our time on the moon with the giant rhinos, I wrote about meeting the Bard and the intergalactic witches, bent on destroying the Earth with words. I wrote about spending time with Milo and Cheen and freeing New New York from the oppressive smog, and even hearing the truth about the Time Lords' lost planet.

But the one thing I left out of all of my entries, the one thing that was too painful to commit to paper, was my relationship with the Doctor. We had kissed, we had shared a bed, but none of it meant anything. Shakespeare laid it bare for all to see, I talked to Milo and Cheen about my feelings, even as the Doctor was turning a city upside-down trying to find me when I was lost. And still, it meant nothing because I was so desperately in love, and he didn't even have a passing interest. I'd been pulled into his life by a tornado of events, and pushed off a cliff into absolute, all-consuming, insane passion for the man himself. But still we existed like two pillars of stone, connected only by the ground beneath our feet and the burden of history.

As I wrote the entry, "2 November, 1930: When Hooverville Reached its Limit," I tried to talk to the Doctor about it. But as usual, he grunted and avoided my eye. Obviously, he had some kind of problem with the journal, and I wondered why, of course. Very soon, I got my answer.

He tried to ditch me.

Sure, he'd warned me that it was one trip only, but one trip had turned into three. We'd been together for what felt like weeks, and risked our lives together and for each other… I thought he'd changed his mind, and that I could stay on for a bit. But all along, he'd been thinking about how to get rid of me.

And _that _was the problem with the journal. If the TARDIS gave it to me, it implied that I was a permanent fixture. All those empty pages meant that I'd continue to have adventures with the Doctor, that I was a real lodger in the TARDIS now, not just a hitcher, as the Doctor saw me.

Then he did change his mind. He took me on permanently, and admitted later that the TARDIS must have known that I was indispensible to them long before he did. By then, I understood his companion issues, why he wasn't willing, at first, to keep me on-board, and why it bothered him that the TARDIS would make that assumption without his consent. I had accepted the big Rose-shaped hole in his life, and the fact that I would never fill it. But that didn't mean I couldn't be an excellent friend and a useful first mate on his ship.

Accepting though I was, I still could not bring myself to write in the journal about my real feelings. "1st April, 2007: Changing What It Means to Be Human," was completely missing the details of how my mum thought we were a couple (and how I didn't rush to correct her), and how my pulse pounded with excitement while the Doctor and I were jammed into that gene mutation machine, hearts to heart, even though we were twenty seconds from death. "The Pentallian: Abide or Burn With Me," had the glaring omission of how I believed for a split second that when the Doctor mouthed _I'll save you_, he'd said _I love you_, but then came to my senses. And I didn't write about the unabashed joy I felt, not only to know that the Doctor was safe after the sun had attacked him, but to see him run at me and open his arms. I didn't write about how he then wrapped them around me, and I wrapped my arms and legs around him and wept with relief into his shoulder.

But when I changed into that plain black dress in 1913, tucked the journal into an old rucksack and followed John Smith into the academy to apply for a job, I had no idea what I was in for. I still couldn't bring myself to do it, to spill my guts on the page like I should have, and it was like holding in a cough. I felt, after three months, that I might explode. Chronicling every day of that horrible time was tedious, and without mentioning that Mr. Smith's occasional kind words made it all worth it, and knowing that in a few weeks, I'd have my beautiful, beloved Doctor back, my journal became a place of grey, cold emotion. It was a melancholy I'd not been prepared to deal with.

My friend Jenny, a fellow servant in 1913, could see, and would say she didn't understand why I was so "sweet on" Mr. Smith, but that, of course, was an understatement. When she watched me watching him, she saw the smile behind my eyes, my lingering gaze, the wistful longing on my face. She didn't know that his presence, his very existence suffused every fibre of my being, and being without him was like torture for me. One woman does not say to another, "You can feel him in your bones, can't you? He's in your blood, like a sickness, isn't he? His smile makes you want to cry, because you burst with some emotion you can't describe, doesn't it?" Not in _that _time period, anyway.

So, no matter how acutely aware I was, as far as I was concerned, my feelings were buried beneath a veneer of proper post-Victorian behaviour, and remembering (God help me) that I was a black woman at a difficult time in history.

When it was over, we re-entered the TARDIS and I wrote the last day of our 1913 adventure (destruction and mayhem, a very cold and objective account of Joan Redfern's personality and involvement) and shut the book. I laid it on the bed beside me, and without thinking, I made a face and pushed it away from me. I had begun to loathe the sight of it. The TARDIS had given it to me, as a permanent member of its crew, not the Doctor. And it was a chronicle of happenings in my life that were overshadowed by desire and longing. I had not written any of it down, and its absence from the book made it all the more obvious: it was a story of love and rejection. It was almost a living, growing artefact of keeping something locked away, unable to confront it, unable to get past it.

So, when we stopped in London to deal with the lizard eggs, I threw the book into the sewer, then apologised to the TARDIS.

The next time we stopped in London, we were touched by stone angels and transported to 1969 without the TARDIS.

That was two days ago. Yesterday, while the Doctor was finding a place for us to live and replenish our wardrobes, I was finding a job and buying a new journal. This one.

But this journal will be done right. It will not be the story of avoiding inevitable heartache, therefore making it stronger. It will be a story that has desire and rejection within, but also the level-headed thoughts of a woman who is not so helpless to her desires that she can't even bring herself to face the words on the page. This new book will help me expel the poison, swim in the love, swim in the misery, and thereby, surmount them.

That means I cannot mince words. I cannot refuse to write about times when my heart palpitates, times when a jolt of hope slams through me, or a surge of lust. It will all be here for the taking.

Starting with this: the tiny flat he found for us has only one bedroom and no sofa. I hardly slept last night, there, curled up in bed next to him. I lay awake almost all night in a room bathed in the blue neon light of a shop across the street, making everything formless and vague. My whole body was alive and throbbing, and would not let me rest.

How do I master myself in these moments? I have a job to do, and I need to sleep some time…


	2. 20 jun 69

20 June, 1969

My job is demeaning and boring, and the weather is crap. I'm meant to be a doctor, for Christ's sake, not a shop girl. And I'm not even a shop girl yet – I'm a shop-girl-in-training! Because it's so difficult to work out how to fold clothes and stack them in order of size, it takes a full two weeks, with probationary pay, to learn the ropes.

I can handle crap weather if I'm doing something constructive with my life, but this? And I know that my Time Lord friend is a little eccentric, but are we really saying he couldn't find a gig repairing radios to help bring in some rent?

Not in a good mood now.

So... when I arrived back at our flat after work this afternoon, he was sitting slumped in one of the armchairs that faces the radiator (I suppose someone's idea of a surrogate fireplace). He was staring at the big metal thing, scowling.

"Honey, I'm home," I joked.

He sighed deeply then smiled very slightly and looked at me. "How was your day, dear?"

"All right. Yours?"

He gestured half-heartedly to a messy pile of gadgets in his lap. Gears, twisted metal, Christmas lights, and a whole array of rubbish I couldn't identify. He showed me the sonic screwdriver in his hand, then put the other hand on his forehead and leaned his head back.

I assumed that it was all meant to be part of some greater gadget that had gone wrong. "So, not good?"

"Not good," he agreed without looking at me. "I was trying to build a remote control that would bring the TARDIS back to us, but I can't calibrate the time circuits because, well... I don't have the TARDIS. It's a bit of a pickle."

I kicked off my shoes and sat down in the other chair. "Why don't you just follow the directions that What's-Her-Name gave you?"

"Sally Sparrow?" he asked. "Because her way will take forever, and we have no idea how long we have to wait! It's a dodgy process over a period of thirty-eight years, and there is no guarantee it will work! Someone wrong might even stumble upon that information and use it for... you know, badness."

"But if that happened, wouldn't we know about it? Wouldn't it be part of her documentation?"

"Probably," he conceded, sort of. "But again, not guaranteed. The future can be changed, Martha. It's all... wibbly wobbly."

"But if you can't get the time calibrations, then what choice do we have? We're stuck in the past without a time machine. But what we _do _have is an instruction manual. How many stranded time-travellers can say that much, eh?"

He sighed again. "I suppose." He closed his eyes and was silent, forlorn. I felt a lump in my throat, even at this slight display of distress from him. "We don't have a choice, do we?"

"No, not really," I agreed. "Why is this bothering you so much? Our work is laid out for us – should be easy."

"It's because..." he began. "Aw, never mind. I'm just being a big baby. Are you hungry?"


	3. 21 jun 69

21 June, 1969

The Doctor made dinner for me last night, and it wasn't fancy, but it was comfort food. Dumplings in gravy with a little bit of very dry chicken. Quite English, quite homey. He pulled my chair out for me, poured my tea and then tidied up afterwards. In the interest of full disclosure as promised, I'll admit that for a little while, I imagined that it was a happy domestic situation, rather than a forced sharing of quarters. Maybe the kids were already tucked away in bed. Maybe we were newlyweds, still with all of that ahead of us, still prone to volatile newlywed behaviour.

I sat at the breakfast counter and leant on my forearms across it, talking and smiling while he washed and dried the dishes. He had removed his jacket and tie and rolled up his shirt sleeves, and I admired the wrists, the hairy arms, the muscles moving beneath the skin, hints of masculinity that I rarely, if ever, see. When he held a plate with his right hand, then glided a warm soapy cloth over the surface with the other, it gave me an almost shameful rush of heat. I'd look up at his face, continue talking, think of our cosy dinner, think of _our_ bed, and pretend that I was just biding time until we could go back to it together, and get lost in each other. I pretended, as I looked him up and down, that this was all just a cute domestic farce, that he would later be mine for the taking. This dinner, these dishes, talking about our day, all a necessary ritual to be performed before we could disappear into the dark.

I thought it healthy to let my mind wander. I know from experience that oppressing something within myself causes nothing but trauma, so I allowed my mind to go mad with the fantasy.

I had not anticipated the torture this would inflict upon my body.

There, in the kitchen, I longed to come up from behind and curl my arms around his waist, lay my head against his shoulder blade, whisper _I love you_. Then, maybe let my hands wander down a bit, force him to stop washing and turn all his attention to me. Okay, it was a nice little dream. I have those all the time.

But later, lying in the dark, listening to him breathe, feeling his heat so near to me and knowing his mind and desires lie so far...

Once again, I couldn't rest. I knew that if I moved my hand three inches, I could feel his skin. He would wake, and the game would be over, but I thought it might be worth it just to touch him in an unguarded moment.

I no longer know: Do I suppress the fantasy, or embrace it? Do I live with the shadow, or the fire?


	4. 23 jun 69

23 June, 1969

When I arrived back at our building this afternoon, the Doctor was standing in the corridor talking to an older lady, whose name, I later learned, is Mrs. Pembroke. By the time I got there, they were discussing the Cuban Missile Crisis (I couldn't tell whether she was aware that it had happened almost a decade earlier, or whether she was, in her senile way, trying to muse over current events). However, apparently, earlier in the conversation, she had complained that her washroom light fixture had been broken for quite some time, and the landlord "could not be arsed" to fix it.

"Well, it's time I got Martha back inside the flat, but why don't I pop round in about fifteen minutes, and see if I can't do something about that fixture?" he said to her.

"Perfect," she said, bright-eyed, delighted with the Doctor. "Thank you, Mr. Smith."

We went inside, I told him about a shop patron who looked a lot like Jessica Simpson, except she seemed to be Eastern European and not as busty. He told me about checking out Wester Drumlins (yes, the angels are there, even now), how tricky it would be to manoeuvre in there. He sat at the breakfast counter with his chin resting in both hands. His eyes drooped, and his mouth went slack.

"You okay?" I asked.

"Yeah," he said, moving one hand to scratch his eye. "Don't have the equipment to do it the quick way, and even the slow way has bloody Weeping Angels and a whole vast, fun cornucopia of unstable time energy. Blimey."

"Don't worry about your equipment," I said, immediately regretting it. "I mean, you are not a lesser Time Lord because of this. You got stuck. It happens."

"I should have seen it coming," he muttered. "I knew what those angels could do."

"And they knew what _you_ could do, or at least your TARDIS," I said. "They were extremely determined and it wasn't a fair fight. Four against one."

"Two."

"I don't count," I shrugged. "I'm no help there."

He ran his hands up and down his face. "Argh, Martha. I hate the slow way."

"Yeah, I've noticed. If I were you, I wouldn't like it either."

He asked if I would make dinner while he went to see about Mrs. Pembroke's light fixture, so I agreed, and he left. Just as I was removing the pork chops from the boil, and dumping them into the wire collander in the sink, I heard shouting.

I poured, took the cinnamon apples off the burner, then ran out into the hallway, oven mitts and all, to see what the commotion was.

The landlord was standing in Mrs. Pembroke's open doorway, taking up most of it, raising holy hell.

I heard the Doctor's voice coming from inside the flat. "Would you calm down? All I did was change a stupid lightbulb!"

"Well, that's not your bloody job, is it, fancy boy!" the landlord yelled. "That's for me to do, and it's for you to shut up, get back in that flat with your black bird, and do your unholy rituals or whatever, and mind your own business!"

_Unholy rituals? _The man sounded like he had marbles in his mouth and a cockney painted on his words like tar, but I was pretty sure I heard right. I almost laughed. Almost.

Then he turned and saw me. At me, he hurled, "You know, you two are bloody lucky I even let you live here! It's unnatural, is what it is, I say everyone should stick to their own kind."

"Is that what you say? Well, it's a good thing we didn't ask your opinion," I said, my temperature rising.

"Now you listen here..." he said approaching me, his index finger poised to shove in my face.

"All right, all right!" the Doctor yelled, coming out of Mrs. Pembroke's flat. "Before you say something we'll all regret, can't we just forget this whole thing? I promise I'll never be helpful again." He had wedged his way into the relatively small space between me and the landlord.

He had his arms spread in front of me in a protective gesture. In spite of my usually acute feminist instincts, I liked it.

The landlord screwed up his features into a look of pure malice. The look in his eye was almost frightening, and it clearly took the Doctor off-guard a bit. His right hand reached down and back, again, protectively. It landed on my thigh, and stayed there. I felt the jolt, the Doctor hadn't even noticed.

"You're bloody right, fancy boy. You'll keep your hands off the lights, the wires, the walls, the rugs, and anything else that strikes your girlish fancy, and let me do my sodding job. Because no hands of no white man who's touched... _that_," he snarled, gesturing contemptuously at me with his chin. "Is gonna come anywhere near my property, understand?"

I took a deep breath and got ready to pitch some choice words right back at him, but the Doctor, hearing my inhale and knowing me far too well, said, "Martha, don't." It wasn't harsh, just firm. I listened, knowing he was right. It wasn't 1913 anymore, but try telling that to this brute.

"Then, sir," the Doctor said calmly. "Why don't you simply have us removed from the premises?"

The horrible man smiled. "You got money, dontcha?" He turned and walked away, laughing evilly.

Mrs. Pembroke watched him go, then turned to us with shock on her face. "I'm sorry," she said shakily, then slammed the door.

"Well, at least the light in her loo works now," the Doctor said. He tossed one arm around me and pulled me in to kiss the top of my head. "Are you all right?"

"No."

"Me neither. I'm sorry."

"Not your fault," I said, wriggling away from him. For once.

"I'm sorry I couldn't stop him," he said.

"Rubbish. I'm sorry _I _couldn't stop him."

He smiled rather sadly. "I know you don't need me for that, but all the same."

"I want to move." I said, trying not to let my hurt feelings show.

"I don't think we can afford anything else."

"You're right about that," I admitted. I took a deep breath and leaned against the wall. "Well, I made pork chops."

"Oh, good," he said, smiling for real now. "Let's do that instead of moving."


	5. 25 jun 69

25 June, 1969

I'm probably being melodramatic, but I feel as though life as I know it came to a screeching halt this afternoon. We fell out, and I feel just a bit annihilated.

Business was slow at the shop, so I was let go, and I came back to the flat at noon.

The Doctor was using the telephone in the corridor, so I walked past him into the flat, dumped my purse on the table and kicked off my shoes, then came out into the hallway. He was no longer speaking, just listening, and not happily. His scowl did not sit well, and almost instinctively, I moved close to him and held onto his arm, giving him my quizzical worried gaze. He didn't look at me, but I didn't care.

Eventually, he ended the call with something like, "Fine, if that's the way it has to be, I guess you leave me no choice." He slammed the phone down, wrenched his arm out of my grip and stomped back into the flat. You'd have never even known I was there.

He began to pace.

I shut the door behind me. "What's going on?"

"I need a hundred pounds," he said.

I was surprised. "Oh. Well, we don't have it right now."

He stopped and stared at me. "What?"

"I'm sorry, Doctor," I said. "We used all the cash we had for the first month's rent, and groceries."

Some tenuous tie holding the Doctor to reality must have snapped then. "Well, what are you doing all day?" he asked, his eyebrows tilted inwards, his voice raising. "I thought you had a job!"

My jaw dropped. "I do! What do you think, I'm wandering the streets from eight to five, looking for a travelling circus?"

"Don't be so daft."

"I'm not the daft one, my darling."

"Well, what's the problem with the money, then?" he asked, ignoring me, his tone growing harsh, his voice growing loud.

"The problem is that we've only been here a week," I answered, just as loudly. "And I haven't got paid yet!"

"Shit," he spat, and began pacing again. "Well, when will you? I can't wait forever!"

"At the end of the month, Doctor," I answered. "And you are going to have to start acting like a reasonable person right now!"

He stopped again, hands on hips. "The end of the month?"

"Yeah," I breathed. "That's how it works. Didn't they teach you anything at Time Lord University?"

"What's today?"

"It's the twenty-fifth," I said.

"Five days?" he asked. He seemed in utter disbelief.

"Yes, why is that so hard for you to accept?" I asked him, a bit more shrilly than I had intended.

"Five whole days!" he shouted, throwing his hands in the air. "Blimey, Martha!"

"I have no control over ths, Doctor!" I handed back to him. "It's five days. You're nine hundred years old; five days goes by for you every time you blink!"

"Don't I know it," he growled. "Blink, and you wind up here."

"Well, yeah. Sometimes life is crap, and you roll with it."

"So, in five days, we'll have the hundred pounds?" he asked.

I felt like I was talking to a nine-year-old, fixated on getting a lollipop after a visit to the dentist.

"Barely!" I answered, again rather shrilly, now gesturing with my arms as well. "But then our rent will be due again, and we have to eat, don't we? We'll have to just set some aside each month. Like normal people do. What the hell do you need it for, that's so important you're yelling at me?"

"Ah, the slow way again," he said, sarcastically, cutting, and ignoring my question. "Like _normal people."_

I put my hands on my hips and took the stance of the monumentally annoyed. "You know what? I'm sorry that being a normal person is so bloody difficult for you, and that you have such contempt for _normal people_. I'm sorry that my species doesn't move fast enough for you."

"Oh, just stop it. Stop it, Martha. You know that's not it. I just don't want to be here!"

I wanted to burst. "Well, then I'm sorry that it's such a heavy burden to have to live here with me, but you don't have a choice, do you?"

"Oh, I am so _sick_ of hearing that!" he shouted, burying his hands in his hair, apparently beseeching the ceiling. "No, I don't have a choice! And it seems that I don't have a choice in _anything_ anymore! I have absolutely no control over my life!"

This time, he was so loud, there was a thump from next door. "Oi!" a voice said. "Shut up!"

We, of course, ignored it.

"Well, welcome to Earth, Time Lord!" I shouted back. "Besides, you're not in this alone, did you know that? Do you think I _like _paying that bastard landlord to live here, when basically he thinks I'm subhuman? And thinks you're subhuman because you live with me? Do you think I _like_ being paid in beans to work in a shop, when in the real world, I'm a few months from my fucking medical degree? Do you think I _like_..."

I almost slipped. I almost admitted how hard it is to live with him, sleep with him every night, but never be close, never touching, never...

"We're not _supposed_ to be living in your world!" he complained. "We're supposed to be in mine! We're supposed to be in my ship, in space, in time, a place where I know what to do, and I can make decisions, and at least know how stuff works and I can help! Here, I'm just..."

He seemed exhausted and threw himself into a chair.

"What?" I asked, crossing my arms and striding toward him. I stood to the side and watched him stare at the wall.

"Helpless," he said raising his hands up, then lowering them again.

"Helpless? Are you mad?"

"No, I'm so lucid it's frightening. We got zapped back in time by those stupid angels, and I was powerless to stop it. I'm a _Time Lord_, for crying out loud, and I'm fucking stranded in time without transport, and I can't even build a remote to bring it back to me. I have to rely on the instructions of some girl who I don't even know, who's never travelled... who is..."

"A normal person?"

"That's not the problem."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure. She's a stranger. That's the problem." He paused. "No, I take it back. The problem isn't her. The problem is me. I can't do anything on my own, not here. I'm not even myself."

"You don't need to be perfect."

"I'm not asking for perfection, Martha, just _something_ to go right! Even the slow way is going to be ridiculously difficult, and we'll run the risk of walking into the path of the angels again when we go back to Wester Drumlins. I can't do that without you – you'll have to keep watch while I write the message."

"So we'll work together, like we always do."

He stood up again, and held his hands out to me, as though begging. "It shouldn't be this hard to write a message on a wall! I can't stop that rhinoceros of a landlord from shouting racial slurs at you in the hallway, and we can't move away from him because we can't afford to. I can't get a camera to make that DVD Easter Egg because I need a hundred pounds to do it, and we don't have that either. We have _nothing_ that we need to set this thing in motion."

"We'll get there, Doctor..."

"We have to travel in time. It's my job to know how to do it, and this Godforsaken place and year _will not let me._"

I was still annoyed. Call me crazy, but I was only thinking of myself then.

"So your solution is to yell at me?" I asked, crossing my arms defensively. "About money? About humanity?

"I'm just frustrated, and you're nearby."

_What about when you're lonely, and I'm nearby? Do you turn to me then?_ I wanted to ask. _I'm frustrated, and __**you're**__ nearby. Can I take out __**that**__ frustration on you?_

"Well, rein it in, mister. I don't like being accused of lying."

"I wasn't really accusing you..."

"Well, it sure sounded like it." I was being difficult, I knew. But I'd run out of options. My own frustration was taking over now.

His body slumped forward, giving up. He walked toward the door. "Just leave me alone for a while, would you?"

"Where are you going?" I asked, only mildly concerned at this stage, going toward the door with him.

"Just out," he answered, mostly a grunt. As he strode down the hall defiantly, he said, "Don't hold dinner for me."


	6. 26 jun 69

26 June, 1969

After the Doctor left yesterday, I went down to the corner book shop and bought, out of curiosity, a copy of _Portnoy's Complaint_, which is brand-new this month in Britain (I'll give a full review on a less eventful day). I took lunch and dinner on my own and read the whole book in-between and afterwards. I did the laundry, including bedsheets, towels, two of the dress shirts I'd bought for the Doctor, my own scant supply of skirts and blouses, pyjamas, and of course, socks and underwear. I absently wondered what I'd do about his suit; all he would wear was the one on his back, so what would he wear while it was at the cleaners? Well, it was his problem, not mine. If the man can break the laws of time and space, he can work out a way to have a suit cleaned without having to ride the bus naked.

Other than that, I managed not to think about where the he had gone or what he'd got into.

I went to bed round ten o'clock, wearing the yellow polished cotton nightgown I'd bought when we arrived. It was newly laundered and felt airy and fresh, so I decided to forgo my knickers for the night. I was oddly relieved to be lying down alone. For once, the bedroom, with its white shears doing absolutely nothing to conceal the hardware store's blue neon sign across the street, felt cool. I settled into the fresh sheets, not feeling suffocated by my own desires, or by the heat in the room itself.

Writing down what happened when the Doctor came back doesn't appeal to me much – it's too much emotion, too difficult to describe. It belongs to me, and if I write it, then someone else might know and shoulder into our world. Besides, in spite of all evidence, I'm not sure how I feel about it.

But I promised I wouldn't shy away from the crazy, miserable, desirous part of my relationship with him, so here goes. Full disclosure, right?

Sleeping unusually lightly, I heard the front door open just after midnight. Seconds later, the bedroom door opened, then shut. I was lying on my side, facing the wall. I opened my eyes, but I didn't move otherwise. He went to his side, and I listened to him undress. Even the sound, without the sight, gave me an annoying tingle. It started at my neck and slid down my spine, landing like a ton of bricks between my legs. Just _knowing _it did this to me, and I cursed myself silently. The man is so irritating, and I was a little angry with him... but I can't turn it off.

I heard the swoosh and snap of his tie as he pulled it swiftly through the collar. I heard his jacket swish off over his shoulders and down his arms. There was silence as he unbuttoned his shirt and cuffs, but then I heard the fabric billow as he pulled it from his body and shook it out to drape over a chair. Pressure on the bed beside me let me know he'd sat down, and ten seconds later, I heard twin thumps in the corner as his shoes hit the floor. He stayed seated for another ten seconds to remove his socks. Then I felt the pressure lift again as he stood up, and I heard the tiny metal _tink_ of the hook in the front of his waistband. Then the smooth, slow buzz of the zip. I almost squeaked with the agony of it, even more so as I could hear the final wisk of his trousers coming down, and off.

Then, he seemed to wait. I didn't know why. I heard nothing, except a deep sigh just before I felt the covers lift and the warmth of him in bed next to me.

It was all over. The way I felt, I reckoned there was no going back to sleep. At this rate, I'd be a certified insomniac within the month.

And he wasn't sleeping either. I could tell, because his breathing never slowed down. After about ten minutes, I heard a whisper. "Are you awake?"

I hesitated. I wasn't sure I wanted him to know. "Yes," I said finally.

He hesistated as well, after that. Eventually, he inhaled, and whispered, "I'm sorry."

"Okay," I whispered back. I turned over and lay on my back. "You know, you're really insufferable."

"Yeah. I know."

I believed that he knew that he was insufferable temperamentally; but I didn't believe at that moment that he knew why I, personally, found it hard to live with him.

But now, I think he did.

Another long silence came, during which I decided to try for sleep again. I closed my eyes, but didn't particularly relax. He didn't either.

And then I felt him stir. Instinctively, I turned my head to see him. He had turned on his side to face me, and suddenly, I found his mouth on mine. I gasped with surprise and felt a renewed rush of tingly heat shoot through me. My head swam; I felt almost drunk.

I realised that he was moving even closer to me, almost in slow motion. Then, gradually, I felt the entire length of his body pressing down on me. We seemed to sink into a cocoon of cotton, our minds lost, bodies disappearing from the world. His tongue pushed into my mouth, and what could I do, but let it? Generally speaking, a woman's body is not helpless against a man who is not a predator, but mine _is_ helpless against the Doctor.

So I pushed my tongue against his, and let him guide me. My lips searched for his in the dark, as his devoured mine. His arms slid underneath my pillow and cradled my head as he kissed me, and my arms curled around him. We were lost. The hunger in his lips told me that he was as enthralled with me as I was with him. A deep groan let me know that he felt a kind of relief, as I did. His arms pulled me in tighter, and I felt his knee wedge in between mine. His thighs gripped my thigh as though his entire body was contracting, and mine was at the centre. A surge, a flex of muscle throughout him seemed to make us interlock. We both gripped tighter, kissed harder, groaned louder.

My hands ran down his bare back until I could feel the elastic waistband of a pair of cotton shorts, then all the way up until my hand was buried in his thick, dark hair. I tugged. He pulled his head up with a little moan, and at the same moment, I felt the first stirring of real arousal from him, twitching against my leg, beginning to harden. He seemed to look down at me, but the darkness in the room would not allow me to see his features. The only proof I had that this was _my_ Doctor, the real thing, was the opaque blue light outlining his frazzled, unmistakable hair. I wondered if he could see me, or if I was just a blue outline too. And if I was just a shadow, was he relieved?

I felt like a spark waiting for a backdraft. It was like his weight on me was condensing and multiplying the lust inside, pressing and consuming all else. He fumbled for the hem of my nightgown, but didn't find it. Nevertheless, he filled his hand with fabric and tugged upward, and with his help, I climbed out of it as quickly as possible. He tossed it to the floor. And with a kind of slow ferocity, his mouth attacked my neck. His teeth and lips nipped my flesh, behind my ear, across my jawline, jugular, down to my collarbone. I moaned. Repeatedly. I couldn't hold it in. He hardened even more, pressed it against me, grinding sometimes, and I just melted at the feel, and even more at the thought of it.

As if I hadn't been before, I was now beyond the point of no return. My body was burning, out-of-control like a grease fire. I was trembling, couldn't abate my quickened breathing and my thighs were now squeezing back. I was slick with anticipation, and I very briefly thought, _what a bastard_.

But that thought went quickly away. He pushed his other knee between my legs, and I willingly parted them for him. As he reached one hand down between us to free himself, he whispered my name, just barely. I gulped hard.

Then he slid inside me, no resistance, no reluctance, no hesitation. No real warning, but he knew I didn't need one. No request for permission either, because he knew he had it, anytime he'd wanted it. And if he didn't know it, the ease with which my body took him in must have given him a clue.

But he'd known. Of course he had.

He moved in me, but he didn't make a big show of being a great lover. He didn't look deeply into my eyes as he thrust, with his huge member caressing me in places I never knew existed. He didn't say filthy things to me, fucking me and making me scream until I was hoarse and the headboard came loose. None of that – he didn't need it.

Lovemaking was not a spectacle to him, at least not then. His body continued to press down on me, spread me open and outward, almost insinuating me into the sheets like before. His hips moved with a subtle pulse, pushing and grinding with no air in-between, and his lips followed the same rhythm across my throat and shoulders. He barely made a sound other than heavy breaths and the occasional whisper of, "ohhh," into my ear.

My body gripped him, my legs, my arms, my insides. I answered his pulse with my own and felt the stimulus everywhere, each time we moved. I breathed hard into the blue air, feeling filled, feeling right, and inflamed. I was climbing, climbing, very slowly, almost in suspension, waiting for his rhythm to bring me to the top. I knew it would – I'd never been so certain before. Still, I tried to urge him to move faster, but he was either too smooth or too lost in himself. I like to think it was the former, rather than the latter. But when I knew the time was coming, I threw my head back and gripped the sheets beneath me. He knew too.

His mouth moved one inch away from the earlobe he'd been sucking, and he whispered lightly, "Let go."

And my body obeyed, blasted the flame like a fire extinguisher, and I was thrown into a whirlwind of release and drunken pleasure. And I knew even then that those two whispered words would echo in my mind for the rest of my life, even if I lived to be three hundred. That gentle command, in a longed-for moment, which threw me into a fitful orgasm, would never, ever leave me.

And almost before I was finished, he let go himself, gripping me tighter and pushing into me hard enough as to be painful. But I didn't care about the pain – I liked the pain. I relished in the whole thing. I was still throbbing inside, and my entire body savoured his release, pulled in his seed, and wouldn't have minded if he never stopped. Everything about it, I touched and imprinted into my memory. The sound of that groan when he came, his mouth buried in the crook of my neck, the spasms inside... and then the tingle as he withdrew.

He rolled over onto his side, he lay down properly beside me, facing me, panting, his hand gripping my arm. He leaned forward and kissed my shoulder, and that's how he fell asleep.

My mind was clouded, but it didn't take too terribly long to come back to me. And if not for the exhaustion he'd brought on, I wouldn't have slept. Again.

So I waited until the morning to think.

We had fought that afternoon. But he had not been genuinely upset with me for not having a hundred pounds just to hand over at that precise moment. He knew that if there was any way to get it, I'd have given it. The Doctor understands the mundane, along with the complex. He knows that a hundred pounds is a lot to ask in 1969 for the average person, and that we are at the mercy of my employer's payroll schedule.

He was feeling overburdened and impotent, and the simple matter of money was just the straw that broke the camel's back. As he said, he was frustrated, and I was nearby.

So, I knew when he walked out the door yesterday afternoon, that his picking a fight had, really, nothing to do with me.

And late into the night, I understood it even better.

This morning, I hope that the Doctor feels a little less helpless. I think he does, and it also may have nothing to do with me.

Or it may. I can't be sure.


	7. 27 jun 69

27 June, 1969

I waited all day. I searched his eyes, but it was like they had gone back to the test signal.

He was already awake when I arose – nothing new there. He had made coffee, which was nice, but no extra effort of omelettes or sausages as he's been known to do on occasion, even in the TARDIS. Especially when he was apologising for something, or felt unusually happy. A few days ago, Mrs. Pembroke took to bringing her newspaper over after she finished with it, so when she dropped it off, we shared the paper, and talked about the current events, all history to me.

It was my day off, so he asked what I was planning to do with my day. I said I wasn't sure, since we didn't have much money, and I didn't want to hang round the flat all day. He said perhaps next week we would try to get back into Wester Drumlins. He did not offer to spend the day with me, though he did mention that it might be nice to have dinner together again, since yesterday evening had been a bust. He left the flat with a friendly wave, saying he was going to try and find some screws to fix the toaster.

I wandered in Hyde Park for a bit. I had a cup of tea at a little parlour decorated with entirely too much pink. I met a lady there name Sascha, from Russia, who wanted to talk about her little girl whom she'd had to leave behind with her sister, just outside St. Petersburg. I was tempted to catch a film, but remembered that I needed to save funds, so I walked a bit more.

I went back to the flat and had a quick sandwich – the Doctor was still out. When I was finished, I went down the hall to see if Mrs. Pembroke wanted to have a chat. Of course she did, so I spent a few hours with her, and her cat, Bixby. I looked at 120,000 photos of her children and grandchildren, and even listened to her play a few simple songs on an out-of-tune piano. A piano, I noted, was quite incongruous and bulky for a flat that size.

When I returned to our flat, the toaster was fixed, and the Doctor was reading _Sense and Sensibility _at the kitchen counter. He looked up and smiled when I came in, and seemed as happy to see me as he ever does. He put his book aside, and then began talking about the hardware store and the book shop. He then told me he'd fixed a broken till at the fish market, and in thanks, the owner had sent him home with two huge salmon filets. He doused one of them in butter and garlic while I steamed some peas, and we had dinner. We saved the other filet in the ice box for a later date.

During dinner, we talked about some of our adventures – Lazarus, the Pentallian, Shakespeare. We reminisced. I said that he seemed in better spirits today, and he answered by saying that he'd been able to put his so-called "helplessness" into perspective. He shrugged and smiled, as though he'd come to this conclusion entirely on his own, or some miraculous beam of light had shone down upon him and his whininess was suddenly cured.

We washed up, and he read some of his book to me. He's not good at doing voices, but I didn't mind too much. I'd read the book before, and I do have a pretty good imagination.

And now, I am sitting in one armchair writing, my legs pulled up underneath me. The Doctor is sitting in the other, legs extended out in front of him, now with _Ethan Frome _on the go. The radiator is sitting cold in front of us, doing nothing but taking up space. The little brown side table between us is growing more rickety by the minute. On it, there is a glass of water for me, and the Doctor's specs. The tablecloth is sitting in a heap by the door to remind us to wash it tomorrow. The plastic fern in the corner is gathering dust.

But the elephant is what's taking up most of the room.

The Doctor just asked if I was ready for bed. Oh good – now we can take Dumbo in _there_ with us.


	8. 29 jun 69

29 June, 1969

How many conflicting emotions do I have? A million? Ten million? I can't sort it out.

Am I happy? Not entirely. Am I angry? Not exactly. Do I feel used? A little. Do I think he meant to use me? No. Am I glad it happened? Well, yeah. Do I want it to happen again? Desperately. Do I think about it every moment of the day? Hell, yes. Do I relish every tiny memory, and tingle all over when I look back? God help me, yes.

But can I bring myself to bring it up if he doesn't? No flippin' way. But am I going to continue to feel frustrated and slighted that he's not bringing it up? Yep.

Is the silence making me wonder if I dreamt it? I dare not answer. It was dark, it was quiet, I'd been asleep... it wouldn't be the first time I've had that dream.

It would be easier if it _had_ been a dream.

This is infuriating. We have actually discussed the possibility of calibrating enzymes and phosphorescent fuels in the outer reaches of the galaxy in order to keep orbit for another million years, followed by the number of sea creatures on Earth that have yet to be identified by science. We have discussed the evolution of the Japanese tea ceremony of marriage and theorised over proto-Indoeuropean languages and how they may have branched off from Palaeolithic African dissonance.

But discuss the fact that we had sex three nights ago? With each other? We two, who are the only people in this world that either one of us has to talk to, or to count on, or to turn to? Of course not. That would make too much sense.

But it's okay, because I've spent most of today in bed brooding over something else entirely. Yesterday I was sent home from work early again, and not because business was slow.

The shop has an old-fashioned soda counter (well, old-fashioned to me... now it's just _fashion_) where they serve sundaes and phosphates and the like. I was re-setting a display of jumpers that had been dismantled by some kids, and I heard a crash. I ran the twenty feet to the soda counter, and there was a boy on the floor, perhaps sixteen years old. One of the stools was spinning. His eyes were wide open, and he was clutching is throat, and seemed to be trying to cough, but his air passage had been blocked. His mother shrieked and got on the floor beside him.

"What happened?" I asked, forgetting my 'place' and rushing to his side.

Without thinking, the mother said, "I don't know, he just fell off the stool!"

Max, the soda jockey, came round the counter. "His eyes rolled back in his head, and then he was gone!" He also knelt.

"You lot, back up, give him room," I said. "If he's having trouble breathing..."

"Oi, who do you think you are, missy?" his mum asked me, looking at me for the first time.

"Trust me, I know what I'm talking about," I said. I tried to think fast. He was seizing mildly, and there would be no way I'd be able to get him upright stably enough to give him the Heimlich. I decided to do it the old-fashioned way. I picked up the boy's head and cradled it in the crook of my left arm. "Max, will you hold his jaw? Like this."

I showed Max a two-handed grip to keep the boy from biting his tongue, as I was planning to plunge my fingers in, and I didn't want to lose them. Max did as I asked, and I shoved two fingers down the boy's throat. He tried to fight me, but he was weak. His face had gone white as a sheet. He must have had a severe drop in blood pressure quite suddenly, not to mention the lack of oxygen. Any moment, he'd begin turning blue.

"What the hell are you doing?" the mother screamed at me, trying to pull her son away from me.

"I'm checking for a blockage! Do you want him to die?" I asked.

"Take your hands off my boy!"

"Miss Jones," I heard behind me. A deep voice had come to scold. "Step away from the boy. Now."

It was Mr. Rowlands, my boss. Rotund, bald and clueless.

"Sir, something is blocking his oesophagus," I explained. "He's had a severe drop in blood pressure..."

"Step. Away," he said, slowly.

I ignored him. I pushed my fingers further down, and the boy gagged hard, but that was the least of his problems. I felt not a blockage but a closure. Nothing had got stuck in his throat, something had caused it to constrict.

Mr. Rowlands then bent down and grabbed me under my arms and dragged me up to my feet. I jerked away from him, and loudly demanded that he not touch me.

"My office. Now," he growled.

"Come on, Martha, let's go," his assistant, Miss Kelly said to me, taking my arm.

"Let go of me!" I insisted, wrenching away from her.

I turned back to the boy and took as quick a survey of the situation as I could, because I knew I'd be dragged off in a few moments. On the counter in front of the spinning stool, there was a sundae, almost untouched, covered with peanuts.

Miss Kelly took my arm again. "Listen! It's anaphylaxis! He needs to get to a hospital right now! He needs an epinephrine shot. It's the peanuts – he's allergic! He's in anaphylactic shock! It's dead serious!"

"Yes, yes, good, good," Mr. Rowlands said condescendingly as he and Miss Kelly escorted me to his office. "We'll see to it."

"I am not kidding! I know what I'm talking about! If he doesn't get an epi shot, he will die, do you hear me?" I shouted.

"I hear you, Miss Jones," he said, patting my shoulder. "There's nothing to worry about."

I was then put in his office and made to wait for over an hour. After fifteen minutes, I thought _sod this,_ and tried the door. I was bloody locked in. I tried to phone the Doctor to sonic me out of there, but it didn't call outside the store. I was trapped and outraged.

When Rowlands finally ambled in, I stood up and said, "How's the boy?"

"Never you mind," he said. "Sit down."

I obeyed, fighting against every muscle in my body. "Just please, tell me how he is."

"That's none of your concern, Miss Jones. It never was."

"I was trying to help. I was nearby..."

Firmly, he interrupted me. "That is not your place, do you understand me? You are here to do a job, and manhandling our customers is not one of them."

"I was trying..."

"I know what you think you were trying to do," he said. "And I'm telling you in no uncertain terms: you remember your place."

He never raised his voice, he never made a slur nor implied that my gender or colour was a factor. He simply behaved like the brick wall that he was, and all that other rubbish was underlying it. It was so maddening, I thought I'd pass out from the pressure in my skull. What was I supposed to tell him, that I'd be getting my medical degree sometime round about thirty-eight years from now, fingers crossed?

"Fine," I conceded, shaking with rage. "But you had no right to detain me."

"Detain you?"

"Yes, detain me. What makes you think you can lock me in your office for over an hour and make me wait to be admonished? Do look like chattel to you?"

"Oh, did I lock the door by accident? My mistake."

I was boiling. I wanted to tear him to shreds. I wanted to scream. Accident? Mistake? My left eye! I could have murdered him.

Instead, I took a deep, cleansing breath and whispered, "If there's nothing else, sir, I'd like to be excused."

"Actually there is," he said. He produced a piece of paper from his suit jacket pocket, and a pen. "Please sign here, and then you may go home for the day. We'll see you tomorrow morning. Punch out before you leave."

I scribbled _Martha Jones_ on the line where he showed me, snatched the carbon copy from his hand and stomped out.

On my way, I stopped at the soda counter. "Max, what happened to the kid?"

Max turned ashen, and I knew. They had detained me to keep me from seeing the death, seeing the police and coroner arrive. God forbid they let a shopgirl be right.

I called in sick today, unsure if I could ever go back there.


	9. 30 jun 69

30 June, 1969

It is, I believe, something of a tradition to give breakfast in bed to someone who is upset or ailing or having a birthday. Last night, I was given dinner in bed. I was first invited to the table, then when I said, "Not hungry, don't wanna," like a child, I was served. I was delighted and surprised. I sat in my nightgown, back to the headboard, and the Doctor sat at the foot of the bed with his legs crossed Zen-style. We had beef tips and rice. This was the first I'd told him about the incident at the soda fountain yesterday. Until then, he thought I had a cold.

He was silent while I told the story. Except, he cursed when I said that I'd been locked in the room while Rowlands and the police tidied up the scene. I said that I could understand why they didn't want me to play doctor, but I did not understand the detention. He agreed. He told me a couple of stories when he'd been held back from helping, and people had died. It should have made me feel better, but it didn't. Not the stories, anyway.

"Sorry," he said. "I guess it really doesn't help, does it?"

"It helps," I said. "Just to hear you try to help." And that was the truth.

He smiled sheepishly. "Okay, so I'm rubbish."

"No, you're not. Seriously."

He smiled again, and reached out for my hand.

We talked more, and eventually, he left me alone. I went to sleep. I suppose eventually, he must have joined me, but I was deep under, and didn't hear a thing.

This morning, lacking a better choice, I decided to go back to work, but not before stopping in the executive offices in Bayswater. It was really just a few cubicles with guys in suits, but it's where the people who ran the little conglomeration of four stores sat, and supposedly ran things.

"Hello, I'm Martha Jones. I work at Cantor's, and I'd like to make a complaint."

A tall lady in a red flowered polyester suit looked at me all shifty-eyed. "Er, what is it you'd like to complain about?"

"My boss, Mr. Rowlands. There was an incident..."

"Yes, we heard. You thought you were a nurse, I understand." She was smirking.

Ugh. Even the _teasing _doesn't allow for a black woman even to _pretend _at being a doctor! I swallowed hard, resisting the urge to argue. "I have extensive medical training, as it happens," I said. "However, that's not the point."

"What is the point, pray tell?" she asked, condescendingly.

"Well, really, the point _should_ be that the boy died. But it's not why I'm here. The point is that while they were covering up that fact, I was _locked _in Mr. Rowland's office, like an animal. That is a clear violation of human rights."

"An employer has the right to do what is necessary to prevent harm..."

"Prevent harm? Excuse me? I was trying to _help_! I am not a cow or a criminal, and I deserved to be treated better than that."

"Er, I'm sorry, Miss Jones, but we're very busy today..."

"Too busy to deal with a civil rights issue?"

"I'm afraid so."

"When will you not be too busy to listen?"

"I'm afraid we're _always _too busy for this," she said sweetly, clasping her hands in front of her, smiling tightly. "Regretfully."

"Are you the owner?"

She was surprised by the question. "No, I'm an assistant to the owner."

"Let me see him. Now."

"I'm afraid that will not be possible." She sucked in air through her teeth. "Terribly sorry, miss."

"If I were a man, would you let me see him?" I asked.

"Miss Jones..."

"If I were white, would you let me see him?" I asked.

"Miss Jones!"

"Listen, this office is far from being the final authority. You have not heard the last from Martha Jones," I vowed. I regretted it later. It sounded trite, and just made me sound like a cackling James Bond villain.

I returned to the flat, shaking. I asked the Doctor to call Mr. Rowlands and lie for me. He did a fantastic job pretending to be my husband, worried that I'd keel over any moment from flu. He said he was pretty sure Rowlands didn't believe him, but I didn't much care.

He said in a deeper voice, imitating Rowlands' northern accent, "_She's never mentioned a husband._ Hm – probably means he likes you. He'd never have noticed otherwise."

"Oh God, please stop," I begged.

After I told him the newest story of degradation and anger at the hands of my employers, he said, "Martha, you have to understand, this is an era before the human rights and civil liberties lawsuit. There aren't laws to protect citizens in that way."

"It's not a question of black or white," I argued. "It's a question of... human and animal."

"Again, there are no laws to protect people in that way. Employers have much more reign right now than they should."

"So that's it. We accept it?"

"We have to. If you take this any higher, Martha, you're going to start... you know, interfering."

"Interfering?"

"Yes, with history. If you push, and I know you will, who knows what could happen? You anger the wrong person, set something in motion..."

"So, like, you think I'll make the papers or something and land myself in the history books?"

"Maybe. It's why we're laying low while we're here. Trust me – I'm a time traveller by trade. No good will come of this. I don't even like making that Easter Egg – too much of an imprint!"

"No good can come? What about my sanity? My peace of mind?"

"Valid, valid," he agreed. "But need I remind you that my..."

"Home planet was destroyed, yeah, I know," I said, rather harshly. "And if you could save them, you would, but it's fixed, and interfering is against the rules. I get it."

"Do you?" he asked.

"What about when we were in 1599, and you said we had to stop the Carrionites from carrying history forward?"

"The planet was at stake, Martha," he said. "Surely you can see the difference."

"Oh, so my pride, my rights don't count?" I was on my feet now, shouting.

"They count," he assured me. "But the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one."

"You're quotingCaptain Kirk? Really?"

"Martha. Let it go."

I let out an angry squeak. "Let it go! That's it? Just let it go?"

"You don't have a choice."

"I guess I don't," I said bitterly. "I guess I'm _helpless_ too."

I grabbed my purse and jacket and left the flat.

I sat in the rubbish pink tea room until dinner, then came back. The Doctor insisted we not discuss the incident any further that tonight. So I sulkily refused to discuss anything at all. I was not a barrel of laughs.

And for the first time ever, the Doctor retired to bed before I did.

It was not good for me to sit and stew in my own juices, especially after I realised that the carbon copy of the form Rowlands had me sign was lying on the kitchen counter. I crossed the room and read it.

"_This document affirms that Martha Jones is officially reprimanded for performing duties outside of her job description which a) had been previously and clearly forbidden, b) caused harm to the organisation, a customer or employee, or c) resulted in loss of funds for the company."_

All three, a, b, and c, were circled. The anger rose in me once again. I nearly kicked the underside of the kitchen counter and sent the pots and pans careening from their precarious position within.

Helping a customer keep from choking to death had _not_ been previously and clearly forbidden, did _not_ result in the harm of a customer, and certainly couldn't be blamed for a loss of funds.

_If I bombed the store, then I'd meet the criteria._

I signed it, I acknowledged it, it was binding. There is nothing I can do about it. I am helpless.

I hate my job. I'm not allowed to use my skills to save a life. I get _locked _in a room by a brutish arse with power over me. I'm not allowed to speak to the owner. The Doctor won't let me pursue it any further, because it breaks _his _rules. What about _my _rules? What about the basic human decency that I was brought up with?

Erosion of kindness, erosion of the soul. And I feel totally at its mercy.

It's midnight. I know what I have to do.


	10. 01 jul 69

1 July, 1969

My reaction to my lot in life was maybe a little inappropriate, but I had learnt from the best.

My actions will not make that heinous document on the kitchen counter disappear, nor bring that boy back from the dead, nor make the company owner's assistant less of a shrew. But they make the sting of being _me _and having to live _here _a bit duller. It's amazing how getting something you really want will put things into perspective.

I understood the Doctor before, but now we are downright kindred. And it may have been the worst idea in the history of interpersonal relationships, but when it feels _this _good, who could have regrets?

When I read that "official reprimand," something snapped in me. I became like a sleeper drone, an automat, bent on one mission.

Once in the bedroom, I shut the door loud enough that I knew it would wake the Doctor. I heard him gasp himself awake, and saw him stir. I walked to his side of the bed, and he watched. I couldn't see his eyes in the blue fog, but I could tell that he'd rolled over on his back, and was looking up at me. I crossed my arms and grasped the hem of my black rayon sleeveless tunic, pulling it up over my head in one stroke. I unzipped my skirt in the back, and let it slide down my hips and drop to the floor. I stepped out of it, leaving me in matching mint green lace bra and pants, not that anyone could tell what colour they were, in that light. Not that anyone would care.

Then, my fingers found the upper corners of the quilt and sheet, and roughly tore it back, throwing it from his body in one motion. He gasped again, but he didn't say anything. He just continued to stare.

Stepping forward, I threw my left leg over the Doctor's hips and rested my knee on the bed, and pulled my right leg up on the other side. I let my bum drop onto his thighs. I was straddling him, and he was not breathing. I think I shocked him good.

I leant down and placed my hands, spread open wide, on his shoulders, and pulled them all the way down his chest and stomach. Slowly. I felt him tense as my fingers glided over his skin, exploring new territory. His hands moved to my thighs, and as my fingers tightened against his stomach muscles, preparing to make the journey back to the collar bone, he squeezed. His hips bucked a little as well. Colour me shocked – the cleverest man in existence is also slightly ticklish!

Feeling him like this, unabashed and without shyness, was something I could never have hoped for. To take a big gulp of his body with my hands, so freely... and to feel something so sinewy and alive and _responsive..._

And I wanted him helpless. I didn't mind lean and virile, but powerful be damned. If I'd had handcuffs, I'd have used them.

As though I were reading Braille, I could feel and know certain things. His chest said he's lean and strong, virile, powerful. The front of his shorts told me that he exhibits more than a few masculine desires, and most importantly, showed that he wants me, at least sometimes. He let out a long, soft groan as I stroked through the fabric and felt a soft twitch as his flesh grew harder. My other hand continued to stroke the stomach muscles. Occasionally, my fingertips would "accidentally" skim just a bit too lightly again, and make him jump. He'd grab fast to my wrist each time, then let go again. After a bit, I reached inside the flap and pulled his _lovely_ member out into the open, and let it slide across my palms and fingers lazily, listening to him struggle for leverage.

He was coiling tighter and tighter like a twisted thread. I could hear his breathing quicken and turn to a pant. I could feel his body on edge, his muscles pulling inward, ready to spring, his skin distended and taut, his air just as sparse, his fingertips digging into my thighs.

I leant forward and ran my tongue from the base of his sternum all the way up to his Adam's apple, which then bobbed with an anxious swallow. I enjoyed the moment, the taste of his skin, and I smiled in the dark. I wondered what would happen if I'd stood up and walked away then, and part of me was tempted to find out.

But who was I kidding? I was as far gone as he was at this stage. I was drunk with power and flooded all over with heat. This is where I let go of a little of my control. I braced myself on my hands, turned up my lips and shoved them against his, with every bit of fire I was feeling. His hands moved round to my bum and squeezed, and his mouth opened immediately. I could feel his head lifting a bit to meet mine, and knew his neck muscles must be straining. Our tongues crashed into to each other somewhere in there, and two desperate groans punctuated the blue darkness. He was avaricious, and I greedily returned the sentiment, unconscious of the fact that I had quit breathing.

When I couldn't take it anymore, I pulled away, panting, and stared down at the man lying beneath me. I could see his hair and mouth, not his eyes. His teeth were gritted and exposed a little, tense, just like the rest of him. I reached up and ran one hand through his hair, tugging – I knew it would drive him over the edge. His entire body arched up and he moaned heartily. He slid his hands up my back and unhooked my bra (quickly, almost as though he'd done it before), then tossed it aside. His breathing, if possible, grew more laboured, running his hands and fingers down and over my breasts, squeezing and massaging the muscles underneath. A new rush of heat hit me, and that was it.

I grasped his shaft with one hand, pulled my knickers aside with the other, and suddenly, I was filled with him. The sensation went so deep, the shockwaves reverberated through so many nerves and extremities, I let out a high-pitched cry, more of an exhalation, and threw my head back. Craving, I repeated the action, impaling myself again, waves of almost painful pleasure shooting through like lightning.

I braced my palms against his chest, he grasped my hips, and I moved. Just as he had, I made small, smooth gestures, letting no light between bodies. My eyes drilled holes into the dark where I assumed his were, and I breathed in rhythm with our movements. I could still feel him coiled under me, straining, and I was sure that he would leave handprint-shaped bruises along my haunches. Faster and faster every minute I went, I ground down on him hard and almost before I knew what was happening, my entire body was rippling with climax. I shuddered and gripped at him, feeling a few stray chest hairs getting pulled into my fists. He grunted at this and grasped my wrists again. I came down from the euphoria, once again burying my hands in his hair, feeling him keen against me as I did so.

Now I could concentrate on him. I moved harder and faster than before, watching his hands dig into the sheets. It took almost no time for him to arch, hiss a desperate expletive into the thick air, and burst like shaken champagne. Once again, my body seemed to tug, to pull in everything he had to give.

I sat atop him for a few moments longer, the two of us breathing hard, soaked with sweat. He reached up and put his large hands on my stomach and ran them upward, over my breasts and shoulders. Every pat of me was buzzing with electricity, and his touch was too much stimulation. I winced a bit, and removed his hands from me. I let his member slip from my body, albeit reluctantly, and I stood up. I took my usual nightgown from the chair where it was draped, and pulled it over my head. I removed my mint green lace pants and threw them in the hamper, then I crawled in on my side of the bed and went to sleep.

This morning, I was the first awake. I felt fantastic.

The Doctor emerged groggily from the bedroom, trousers only, after the coffee was made and Mrs. Pembroke had dropped off her paper. His hair was, I suppose, a horrible mess, but really, who could tell?

"Er, hello?" he said, looking at me expectantly. Expecting what, I don't know. Well, actually, I do.

"Hi. This is really cool – there's a story about the Apollo 11!"

"Good. I smell coffee."

"Yep. There's still half a pot. Knock yourself out," I said.

"Thanks. How long have you been up?"

"An hour."

"Really? Aren't you exhausted?" he asked, glancing at the clock on the little brown end table.

"Why should I be?"

He looked at me for a bit longer, then shrugged. "All right," he said, heading for the percolator.


	11. 03 jul 69

3 July, 1969

Two days of meaningless fodder.

Breakfast, newspaper, chitchat, my "husband" called me in sick once again. Walked to a creepy old house, stared out the windows at stone statues while my friend wrote giant black letters on a wall, then papered over them. Lunch, haircut for me, scrap metal for him, _Ethan Frome_, then dinner. Went out for ice cream, took a stroll. And that was it. Nothing of particular consequence occurred the day after, even though the elephant in the room had got bigger.

Finally yesterday, I was tired of being a victim, so I went back to work. Besides, soon, our funds would begin to deplete to desperation point.

When my shift was over, one of the sales supervisors asked me to stay late to cover for a girl who had gone home ill. She offered time-and-a-half, so I agreed, and I called home to let the Doctor know not to count on me for dinner. Mrs. Pembroke answered the phone, as usual, since it was on the wall in the corridor, right outside her flat. And she's usually bored out of her mind.

"Oh, hello, Martha dear," she said. "I suppose you'd like to speak to your sweetheart."

"That would be nice," I answered. "But how are you?"

"I'm fine," she chuckled. "In fact, he's in my flat, as we speak, with his handsome head under my kitchen sink. But don't worry. I'll make sure and send him back to you before dinner."

"Well, that's what I wanted to tell him," I said. "I won't be home until late. Someone's got sick, so I'm going to finish her shift, and help close the shop. Do you want to just pass that along?"

"Oh, honey, I'll let you tell him yourself. Just a minute, now."

I waited about twenty seconds, and then, "Hi. Who's sick?"

"Penny Bathgate," I said. "She's always been nice to me, and the supervisor tonight is one with a slightly less-hideous personality than the others, so I said yes."

"Okay. What are you going to do for dinner?"

"I hadn't thought about it," I confessed. "There's always the soda fountain."

"You're going to have ice cream for dinner?"

"I can think of worse things."

"I'll bring you something, after I'm done here, okay?"

"Thanks, I'd love that. Just a sandwich – something simple would be great."

"I'll see what I can scare up."

At about seven, he walked into the store with a paper sack. I was ringing up a customer, but the little _ding_ of the bell attached to the door made me look up. He caught my eye and gestured toward the soda fountain. As soon as I was finished, I went and joined him at the counter.

"How's your day been?" he asked.

"Well, no-one's died, so things are looking up," I sighed, sitting down beside him.

He began pulling things from the sack, bundles of things wrapped in aluminium foil. They were still warm, and a bit greasy.

"What did you do?" I asked.

"I went native."

I tentatively spread open the foil and steam poured out. He had breaded and deep-fried chunks of the salmon he'd got from fixing the till at the fish market, then cut some potatoes into chips and deep-fried them as well.

"Wow!" I laughed. "You sure did! Home-made salmon fish 'n' chips? Are you sure you're not British?"

"Well, if I spend any more time here... oh, and I brought these, for good measure," he said, pulling two bright red apples from the sack. "Can't have our arteries clogging completely, now, can we? Well, it would take longer for me, since I have two sets of them, but you..."

"Vinegar?"

"Ah yes," he said, taking a small bottle of malt vinegar from his pocket.

"What made you do this?" I asked.

"I was in a good mood," he said, shaking vinegar into my foil packet, then his. "I talked to the bloke today who will rent us movie camera."

"Okay," I said, taking a shy bite of fish. I held it lightly on my tongue until it didn't feel so hot. "But, where are you going to get the money?"

"From Mrs. Pembroke," he answered. "She paid me for all the stuff I've been doing round her flat."

"Really?"

"Yeah, just out of the blue. I actually tried to stop her, but she kept swatting me away. And I do mean _swatting_. She gave me twenty pounds each for fixing her pipes today, for the fixture in her loo, for the upholstery and the radiator."

"That's unbelievably generous. Does she know how much that is?"

"Er, when she paid me, she pulled out her wallet and it was _stuffed _with bills. She's got to be a drug dealer, at least."

"Wow. So, what's with the upholstery and radiator? I didn't know you'd fixed those things."

"You were in bed all day that day. The upholstery in one of her armchairs tore, and she tried to fix it. I happened by her door while she was inside cursing her arthritis, and I finished the job. While I was there, she mentioned her radiator was broken, so I fixed that too. Sonicked it. She didn't even notice."

"It's July," I said, chewing. "What the hell does she want with her radiator?"

"I don't know," he shrugged. "She's seventy-five. She gets cold."

"You're older than she is," I teased. "You don't get cold."

"I guess I'm just hot-blooded," he said.

Our eyes met for just a second, and we both blushed.

"So," he said, then cleared his throat loudly, and stuffed some chips into his mouth. "Now we have eighty pounds. We can afford the last twenty, right?"

"For this, definitely," I said. "Do you need me to give it to you?"

"No, I think I still have some notes stashed away in my sock drawer. When you get home tonight, I'll probably have some very good news."

"Cool!" I exclaimed.

We ate the rest of our meal, then the Doctor packed up all the foil and apple cores, stuffed them back in the sack and left. I finished Penny's shift and punched out at ten.

When I came in, the lights in the flat were out, except for in the bedroom. The Doctor was lying on the bed, hands tucked behind his head, staring at the ceiling. He was scowling. His good mood had clearly been undercut somehow.

"Hi," I said, dropping my purse and shoes by the door.

"Hi."

"Whatcha doing?"

"Trying to calm down."

"Why?

"The bloke with the camera..."

"Let me guess. He wants more money."

"Yep," he said, angrily popping the P. "Wanker."

"Well, you're taking it well."

"No, I'm not. I threw a book."

"Oh."

"I broke that purple vase. So I've been repeating a Zen mantra in my mind for the past hour."

"Well," I said. "How much does he want?"

"Five hundred."

"What?" I asked. "That's ridiculous!"

"I know."

"You'll have to do a lot more for Mrs. Pembroke than just odd jobs, Doctor," I teased.

He turned his scowl toward me. "Not funny."

"Sorry," I said, suppressing a smile. I sat down on the bed. "Doctor, it's a setback. We knew we were in this for the long haul. We still have no idea when that Billy Shipton bloke is turning up, and come to that, you haven't even begun work on the... what did you call it? Timey Wimey Detector?"

"Martha, please," he groaned. "One failure at a time."

I clicked my tongue. "All right, you big whiner," I said, What can I do to help? Sugar? Alcohol?"

He turned his head and pouted. "I don't know if there's anything," he said. "I'm just tied up in knots again. It'll pass."

I searched his face. Pain and frustration. His eyes were deep and down-turned, the depression of a sedentary man who's used to living life at a constant full sprint. And of course, me being me, his pain is my pain.

I stood up and shut the door. I turned off the light, leaving us bathed, once again, in blue fog.

I sat down on the bed where I'd been, and I whispered, "_Now_ is there anything I can do?"

He sat up and faced me. He reached up and traced the outline of my left eye and ear with two fingers, then let them wander down to my mouth. He traced my lips as well, then gently parted them and put his fingers into my mouth. I swirled my tongue around his fingertips, and I could hear his breath hitch.

With his other hand, he took my wrist and moved it. I found my palm pressed against the zip of his trousers, a pleasant swelling occurring beyond it. He pulled his fingers from my mouth, leaned forward and kissed me tenderly, then whispered, so, so, slightly, "You know?"

"I know," I said within a breath. "Lie down."

So he did. And I knelt between his knees, and gave him what he wanted.


	12. 04 jul, 69

**Winding down now - second to last chapter! Martha's having a rough go...**

4 July, 1969

I think that the Doctor and I have exchanged one kind of helpless for another.

I had a horrific day at work. A lot of customers look sideways at me, or won't allow me to help them. They always find an excuse, but I know the truth. Most of the time, I just sigh and find something to fold.

Yesterday, a woman came in, and at first, she found nothing objectionable about me. She was rather non-descript; neither homely nor attractive, neither fat nor thin. The only definitive thing I thought when I first saw her was, "She looks like she has money."

I was nearest to the door when she entered, so I approached her.

"Good afternoon, may I be of assistance?"

"Hello," she said, nicely enough. "I'm looking for something new to wear in front of my husband's boss. He and his wife are coming for dinner this weekend, and I don't have anything suitable. Everything in my closet is so out of date!"

"All right, then," I said. "I can certainly help you there."

We chose three dresses, and I installed her in one of the fitting rooms. "My name is Martha, if you need anything. A different size or colour, or just a second pair of eyes, maybe."

Then I immediately hit the racks again, in order to find one more thing for her. I knocked on her fitting room door, and said, "Ma'am? It's Martha. I've found something else you might like, do you mind if I hand it to you?"

It was a tactic we use with customers in the fitting rooms, so that they hear our name twice. Because we collect commission, if the customer remembers our name at the time of purchase, all the better for us.

Miraculously, she decided to purchase all four dresses. She brought them to the counter, and I began to process the sale. She reached out and touched my hand to interrupt me. I looked up at her, and her eyes were wide as saucers. She pulled her hand away abruptly.

"I'm sorry," she said.

"What's the problem?" I asked her.

"I'm sorry," she repeated, looking me worriedly in the eye. "But I'd really rather, erm..."

"Yes?"

"I'd really rather that someone else ring the sale." With that, she lost eye contact with me.

My gut turned over twice.

"Why, may I ask?" I said, my voice trembling.

"Erm," she said, swallowing hard. "I'm not used to... well, I've been told that... it's just, you see, it's a lot of money, and..."

"You know what? Never mind," I said, conceding before she finished her thought. I bellowed out Sylvia's name, a fellow salesperson, a white woman.

She came running. "Will you ring up this sale?" I asked. "I'm going to go through the boss' desk drawer, see if there's anything good I can nick. See you at quitting time."

The customer looked near tears, and I thought she rightly should. I went and sat in a ladies' room cubicle, and tried not to cry. Mascara in 1969 runs something awful. Five minutes later, I heard the door open, and Sylvia's voice.

"Martha?"

"Go away."

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah, well."

"She felt awful," Sylvia said. "She said to tell you she's sorry too. She even remembered your name."

"Well, wasn't that big of her?"

"Martha, she's a rich lady, she's not used to being around..."

I whimpered. "Blacks."

"Yeah."

My mind wandered back to my own family in 2007. Smugly, I thought that the Joneses could buy and sell that 'rich' woman, _and_ her husband's boss. I usually try never to have such thoughts – our wealth, of course, doesn't make us better than anyone else. I had been taught that over and over and over again, growing up. But 1969 is bringing out something nasty in me... well, clearly.

"Do me a favour, Sylvia. Get the hell out." Now the tears had come.

"I'm sorry, Martha," she repeated. "Look, why don't you go home an hour early. I'll tell Mr. Rowlands you're feeling sick again."

"He won't believe you," I said, sniffling.

"Do you care?"

I stood up and opened the cubicle door. Sylvia stood, surprised.

"You know what?" I said. "I don't. Thanks, Syl. I'm getting out of here."

Each time I leave that place in a huff, I think I'm never going back. I think I'm going to find a better job where people aren't such arseholes, but then I realise where and when I am, and I know I wouldn't find anything better. Then I think I'm finally going to demand that the Doctor carry his share of the load, but then I wonder when, exactly, we'd haggle over the camera, make the recording, build the Timey-Wimey Detector and locate Shipton. I know I couldn't do most of that stuff, so, that leaves me paying the bills.

Well, at least at the shop, I have people like Sylvia, who can be clumsy, but who try to be nice.

There was a note on the kitchen counter when I arrived that said, "Trying to find proper Timey-Wimey parts. Hitching a ride out to Surrey with Mrs. P's cousin Winston. Will bring home dinner around 8."

He was as good as his word. He walked in at 7:55 with a big bag of spare parts from God only knows what kinds of weird gadgets, and a pizza. A rare treat!

His asking about my day over dinner led, inevitably, to the story of the rich lady.

"Rich of cash," the Doctor quipped. "Morally bankrupt."

I buried my head in my hands, the pressure of the day not leaving me yet. "I just... argh!"

"Sorry, I guess making puns isn't really helping."

"No, it's all right. Nothing's going to help. We just need the TARDIS back."

The Doctor sighed. He stood up and disappeared, and I didn't move.

Then, I heard his voice. "Martha, could you come in here?"

"Okay," I said. I followed the sound of his voice to the bedroom. He was sitting on the edge of the bed when I came in. Never taking his eyes off me, he stepped past me and shut the door, then killed the lights.

Blue haze, unspoken events, desire.

He took my head in his hands and kissed me, then said, "Tell me what to do."

So I told him. And he did it.


	13. 17 apr 07

**Final chapter, all. It's a little bit brutal.**

**I hope you folks appreciate the ending, even if it doesn't end the way some of us would like...**

* * *

_**NINE WEEKS LATER...**_

17 April, 2007

The TARDIS appeared in front of our building just after two o'clock in the morning. We heard it arrive; that unmistakable, otherworldly sound carried itself upon the air all the way to the bedroom. Luckily, we weren't sleeping, or we'd have had to wait until sunrise. We finished what we were doing, packed as much as we cared to take with us, and left.

The Doctor scribbled a note to Mrs. Pembroke, making some excuse about us having to go to Australia to live with a sickly friend, on short notice. Other than that, we said no goodbyes, and certainly shed no tears.

I had never been so glad to see the inside of that crazy machine. It seems a bit strange to say so, but walking into the TARDIS felt like I'd got my old life back. Even though travelling through time and space in a vehicle that's bigger on the inside than it is on the outside has nothing to do with _my_ old life, or anything resembling normalcy, I feel as though I'm home.

But there's a catch. Back in the TARDIS means back to the status quo. It means back to _our_ things, in an environment we can control. It means frustration ebbs, and real problem-solving becomes easier. It means we're not helpless anymore. It means no more dark blue hardware store sign across the street and no more forbidden exploits to dull each other's pain.

One thing will stay the same, though: we _still_ will never talk about it.

For three months, we have put our frustrations on each other. Every little ache got us our way, every feeling of pity ended with total submission. In the dark, I have instructed the Doctor to do things to me that I'd never admit to again, because I couldn't say them in the light. I have succumbed to desires of his that he would never acknowledge having, outside that room. I've tasted every inch of him, and he of me, and for three months, when the door was shut, neither one of us ever said no to the other. I've been on my back for him, on my stomach, on all-fours, on my knees, standing, sitting, leaning and stretched. He's worked his tongue, his fingers, his cock, every muscle in his body for me, doing whatever I asked.

I've gripped the headboard in front of me while the Doctor rammed me against it, wedging my fingers between the wood and the wall, feeling pain and welcoming it. He's pulled his mouth away from me only after he heard me say "enough," finally, after climaxing for the eighth time. I've coaxed him to come a hundred times, taken it inside, let it splash across my skin, licked it, swallowed it and toyed with it. He's given me a thousand thrusts to the core, exhausted me to the point of numbness and dehydration, when even my eyeballs needed artificial moisturising.

We spent three months increasingly frustrated, helpless and trapped in a time and place where neither of us had much power. And in response, we spent those three months helpless to one another, where both of us, alternately, had _all_ the power. The cause-to-effect relationship was clear, though the two circumstances never crossed. We made love (or whatever you want to call it) a hundred times and never once looked each other in the eye, nor spoke a word about it. Though I acknowledge that I did have a chance to change that, after the first time I took out my helplessness on him.

And now, still not talking about us, and also not fucking. Life in the TARDIS – pretty much back where we started. Almost literally, in fact. It's 17 April – we came back to the day after we disappeared from Wester Drumlins, only a couple weeks after he whisked me off from that alley, the very first night we were together. I look back on that night with fondness, and also with a little regret. Not that I'm sorry I came, but I was so naive back then. I really thought he'd chosen me because he fancied me, and I thought something would come of it.

Things have not gone the way I'd pictured. Only a few days have passed in this world, but in _our_ world, though we're right back where we began, much has changed. Things are warped, perception is skewed, and in some ways, I think that nothing will ever be the same.

Is it, friendship equals power, and love equals helplessness? Or is it just that friendliness equals power, and _lovemaking _equal helplessness? Or is it, Doctor equals power, and Martha equals helplessness? Or is it, light equals power, and dark equals helplessness... or is it vice versa? Or is it that we're always helpless, it's just a question of a reliable coping mechanism to give us the illusion of power?

I'm in my flat right now, in my own bedroom that I share with no-one. It's been ages since anyone has been in this bed with me. The Doctor brought me back here at my request, to gather some things for the next leg of our journey together. He's just stuck his head in and asked if I'm ready, because the TARDIS is drained from sitting too long unattended, and we have to stop in Cardiff. I have no idea what those two tidbits have to do with each other, but that's why he's the pilot and I'm the first mate.

There is a blue police box in my living room, waiting for us to go inside. There is a man in that same living room pacing, a tall man who makes me ache, makes me feel prickly and tingly all over, and whom, in spite of it all, I'd give anything to have.

And damn it. My coping mechanism is gone.

I know I said that nothing will ever be the same, but... I'm definitely back.

END

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**The way I figure it... not every story about the Doctor and Martha getting it on means they have to live happily ever after. Not every question has to be answered, not every issue gets resolved, especially since this is Martha's POV, and her private journal. And as we all know, somet of the best storytelling comes from longing and disappointment! **

**Thanks for reading!**


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